Gambler
by Fate VII
Summary: (for misura) Ryou and Bakura play a game. Not any game, though...a game of dice and divination. Strange. Bakurae. And Ryou's house is just about destroyed by the fifth sentence or so. Oops.


For Misura. I'm sorry it's so late! I'm sorrrryyyy!

YGO isn't mine – go bother Takahashi-sama for it. The plotbunny isn't mine, it's Misura's. The actual writing is mine, though. Steal it and prepare to have your soul devoured. Or in lieu of that, your spleen.

**::gambler::**

They're both laughing and both playing a game, and passing whatever they're drinking back and forth. With anyone else, I'd be sure it was alcohol, but knowing one of them...it's probably just got lots of sugar in it.

Well. Maybe knowing _both_ of them.

And it's oh so flirty and oh so full of subtext, even though they're playing full-out and pushing each other to the edge of sanity. Match after match after match of whirling explosions, of monsters and laughter and traps.

_Life_ is one big game, and they're not only playing it.

They're winning.

Bakura swiped one hand through his hair briefly. "There is no sodding way out of this one. Throw the match now so we can keep going."

Ryou looked vaguely amused. "Oh, please. That's maybe the twelfth time you've said that, and I've won at least two of those times."

"Once. The first time. When I was joking," Bakura retorted. "It's not like you haven't kicked my ass just as many times."

"That's true..." Ryou grinned impishly. "So you won't mind me giving it a go, then? Since you're so secure?"

"That's not a good sign," Bakura muttered.

"So the fact that I'm using Labyrinth of Nightmare to flip all your defending beasties into action isn't a source of worry to you? Hmm, must not be. Guess I'll take them all out. Oh, look, you lose points when I do that. Now I wonder how many that will add up to..."

_"Yadonushiii!"_

"Yes?"

Bakura glowered. "You are _so_ getting slaughtered tonight."

"Actually, I think that's your position right now," Ryou retorted cheerily. "Not a clue what's giving me that idea, though. Perhaps it's the fact that...ah, there, you've lost."

"Damn. You."

"Play again?" Ryou grinned impishly, dismissing the holograms with a wave of one hand. "What to do, o master of games?"

Bakura grabbed the suspiciously unmarked bottle and took an expressive swig.

"Or should I just take that to mean 'go to hell'?"

"New game?"

"You know, we should probably take a break before we tear the house down," Ryou noted, looking around.

Bakura blinked at the wreckage the pair had made. "Why? Your father's not coming home for another six months or so, yeah?"

Ryou thunked the base of his hand to his forehead. "So not the point."

"Oh, yeah, he could show up by surprise," Bakura said thoughtfully.

"_Also_ so not the point, but if it motivates you to do something towards putting the table back together, I'll go with it."

"..." Bakura glared helplessly at his other half. "Nothing's going to get you off this topic, is it?"

"You know, we should try playing a game sometime that doesn't tear the house apart, put people into comas, or get us both really drunk," Ryou proposed.

"Then where's the fun in that?" Bakura demanded.

Ryou gave this a good deal of thought. "Um…the thrill of trying something new?"

"If you suggest checkers, I'm throwing something at you. Preferably something heavy and blunt."

Ryou fished in his pocket momentarily, then came up with a handful of dice. "Ever heard of cleromancy?"

"No," Bakura said. "Is it a variation on poker? Because – "

"_No,_" Ryou said firmly. "It's divination with dice."

"Divination?" Bakura blinked. "That's not a game. I use that to kill people."

Ryou smiled. "But you're really quite good at it. Here." He handed three dice to his other half, swiped the unmarked bottle, and took a sip, then sketched a circle in the dust on the floor with his toe. "Throw them in here. If they fall out, they don't count."

"These aren't normal dice," Bakura complained. "There's no numbers. There's just dots."

"Ditz," Ryou accused. "Normal dice have dots. You've only just played RPGs with my other dice."

"…hn." Bakura looked irritably at the floor, then tossed the dice.

"Now how the hell can you make those things twirl on end when they're cubes if you've never seen them before?" Ryou demanded. "It took me forever to learn how to do that."

"Whose body am I sharing, now?"

"…ah. Right." Ryou crouched to look at the results. "Two. One fell out." He picked up the dice and started toying with them.

"What's that mean?"

"Circumstances aren't what you think they are," Ryou reported.

"I prefer cards," Bakura told him. "They get a little more specific."

"You can toss sets of three dice all at once and cross-reference," Ryou said. "Besides, you're good at this. I mean, hell, you're supposed to divine with _tarot_ cards, not Duel Monsters."

"You know the theory behind the two cards are of two very different religions, right? Religions which kind of clashed badly, according to your history?¹" Bakura pointed out.

"…oh! Oh, right," Ryou said. "My point was that you've invented your own system of divination. A very reliable one. So…?"

"I know what it means," Bakura said tersely, picking up the dice and shoving them at Ryou's face. "Your turn."

"Two, two, one," Ryou said after a clatter of dice on the floor. "The low numbers are certainly showing up a lot."

"Five…?" Bakura questioned.

"What you want may come true soon," Ryou reported, handing the dice back.

"What do you want?" Bakura inquired.

"Something's telling me it won't be world peace," Ryou said dryly.

"You don't want world peace," Bakura scoffed.

Ryou fixed on his most limpid eyes, clasped his hands over his heart, and began mournfully, "But I'm your other half! You're just so evil and want mass world destruction so badly that I have no choice but to ­– _ack_" he finished when Bakura took a swipe at him.

The mock-fight that ensued was spectacular enough that the 'mock' was only there because Bakura wasn't trying to _kill_ Ryou.

Somewhere in the process, the dice were dropped.

"Oof," Ryou announced as Bakura perched on his back. "Seventeen, by the way."

"What?"

"One of us rolled a seventeen. I think it was you," Ryou added.

"And what's that?"

"It means _get off my back before I bite you."_

"Bring it. Hey! Bad teeth! That's not fun biting!"

"Actually, it means that you should follow the advice of others. Look, it came true."

Bakura leaned over and smiled at Ryou. "You realize how kinky biting me is?"

"Yes, and?" Ryou retorted.

"…" Bakura looked momentarily thrown. "Uh, this was the part where I expected you to start flailing and proclaiming your love for all things female."

"Aaaaaand?"

"And you're not."

Ryou nodded. "That's correct."

"Buh?"

"You know…these said that something I wanted would come true." Ryou retrieved the dice and began toying with them idly. "What do you say to that?"

"Erm," Bakura said intelligently. "Are you…?"

"Is this the part where I spell out the fact that I'm obsessed with you in a very disturbing fashion, considering that you're my evil twin from somewhere very hot but too sandy to be hell?"

Bakura had obviously gotten lost around the thirteenth word or so. "With…_what?!_"

"Oh please. I'm only human, you know. Flirting with me constantly isn't going to make me _not_ attracted to you," Ryou pointed out. "Being in my mind at all times doesn't help, either. It's damn hard to focus on other things."

Bakura gave this some thought. He then hopped off of Ryou, flipped him over, and kissed him. Hard. And, well, what the hell, after about five seconds, pretty deeply too.

"You have any idea what you're getting into?" Bakura demanded raggedly after a few minutes. "You're not exactly psychologically stable, and I'm not…human."

"It's what I want," Ryou pointed out gently.

"It's what _I_ want," Bakura replied.

There was a moment of silence.

"However, if you insist on having your way with me, it will _not_ be on the floor with all the dust and other icky things that are getting in my hair," Ryou announced.

"We're going, then," Bakura said brightly, tugging him to his feet and into the hallway.

"All right, all right," Ryou said, laughing. "I always said you were a repressed mmph…"

Somewhere along the way, the dice were thrown.

_Three, three, three…nine,_ Ryou totted up mentally. _Romance takes an unexpected upward turn? Heh…aw, hell, I'm going to have to wear something with a collar tomorrow if he keeps doing that…_

"Good game?" Ryou asked softly.

"Excellent game," Bakura replied from about an inch away. "Let's play again."

¹ Kemetic Orthodox vs. Judaism. Bakura would probably side with the Egyptians and be stubborn about it. Well, probably. I don't hate Judaism, so please don't take it like that! I'm Kemetic Orthodox and I study the tarot! Don't kill meeeee!

**please**** review?**


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